Stephen E. Hutchinson, Appellant-Defendant v. State of Indiana, Appellee-Plaintiff (2026)

MEMORANDUM DECISION

[1] In August 2023, Stephen E. Hutchinson was placed on probation after pleading guilty to Level 4 felony child molesting and serving the executed portion of his sentence. Between August 2023 and April 2025, Hutchinson violated the terms of his probation twice. After violating the terms of his probation for a third time in January 2026, the State petitioned to revoke Hutchinson's probation, alleging that he violated the terms of his probation by, among other things, possessing obscene material. Hutchinson admitted to the violation, and the trial court revoked his probation and ordered him to serve 1,215 days in the Indiana Department of Correction (“DOC”). On appeal, Hutchinson argues the trial court abused its discretion by imposing that sanction. We disagree and affirm the sanction.

Facts and Procedural History

[2] In June 2020, the State charged Hutchinson with two counts of Level 1 felony child molesting, two counts of Level 4 felony incest, and one count of Level 5 felony criminal confinement, which stemmed from sex acts with a child who was related to him. In August 2022, Hutchinson agreed to plead guilty to one count of Level 4 felony child molesting in exchange for dismissal of the five original counts. On September 7, 2022, the trial court accepted the plea, entered judgment of conviction, and imposed a sentence of twelve years, with seven of those years suspended to probation.

[3] The trial court ordered sex-offender conditions for the first three years of Hutchinson's probation and standard conditions for the last four years. As conditions of Hutchinson's sex-offender probation, he was required to register with local law enforcement authorities as a sex offender and comply with all registration requirements; required to consent to searches of his personal computer at any time; prohibited from possessing or viewing obscene material or child pornography; and prohibited from deleting, erasing, or tampering with information on his personal computer with the intent to conceal prohibited activity.

[4] Hutchinson began serving his probation on August 11, 2023,¹ and first violated the terms of his probation less than one week later. Hutchinson admitted that he had failed to consent to a search of his computer device because he had an unmonitored smartphone and that he had viewed pornography. The trial court returned Hutchinson to probation and imposed additional terms.

[5] Hutchinson violated his probation for a second time in December 2023. He admitted that he had (1) failed to consent to a search of his computer device due to having an unmonitored smartphone; (2) viewed pornography; (3) failed to communicate truthfully with the probation department by having an unmonitored and unapproved smartphone; (4) failed to comply with sex-offender registry requirements by having unregistered social media accounts; (5) failed to complete court-approved sex offender treatment by failing to pay fees; (6) deleted a pornographic video from his phone; and (7) possessed obscene matter. The trial court ordered Hutchinson to serve two years in the DOC, followed by a return to probation.

[6] In June 2024, the trial court modified Hutchinson's sentence to three years in community corrections, followed by probation. Between June 2024 and April 2025, Hutchinson violated the terms of his community-corrections placement on four separate occasions and admitted that he had left his residence without authorization; failed to return to his residence as scheduled; failed to complete polygraph testing; and missed his sex-offender treatment by failing to pay for the treatment. In April 2025, after the fourth community-corrections violation, the trial court revoked Hutchinson's community-corrections placement and his probation and ordered him to serve 1,095 days in the DOC – with credit for 689 days. Upon release, Hutchinson was to serve four years on probation.

[7] On January 13, 2026, after Hutchinson's release from the DOC, the State filed its third notice of probation violation, alleging Hutchinson had failed to: refrain from possessing obscene material; consent to a search of his personal computer; register with local law enforcement within seventy-two hours of being released back to probation; and communicate truthfully with the probation department.

[8] On February 17, 2026, the trial court held a fact-finding hearing on the State's notice of Hutchinson's probation violations. Although the matter had been set as a contested hearing, Hutchinson elected to admit his violations. The trial court found that Hutchinson had violated the conditions of his probation and revoked his probation. The court confirmed that Hutchinson's remaining “backup time” was four years and advised him that it could impose a sanction of “anywhere from zero to four years[.]” (Tr. Vol. 2 at 5.)

[9] Marion County probation officer Jordan Priest asked the trial court to impose the entire four-year “backup[,]” because Hutchinson had been “violating [probation] since August 23rd of 2023,” and had been “revoked to [the] DOC at least twice before, only to violate upon getting out.” (Id. at 7.) Hutchinson apologized to the court for being “back in front of [the court] again.” (Id. at 5.) He told the court that he had established two nonprofit organizations with missions of reducing recidivism and providing services to individuals involved with the justice system. His defense counsel asked the court to consider a sanction “closer to three years[,]” citing Hutchinson's admission to his probation violations and his efforts in the community. (Id. at 7.)

[10] The trial court ordered Hutchinson to serve 1,215 days of his previously suspended sentence in the DOC, the “equivalent of three years and four months[.]” (Id. at 8.) The court noted that it had not imposed the “full backup” of four years because Hutchinson had admitted to the probation violations. (Id.)

Discussion and Decision

[11] Hutchinson appeals the trial court's order that he serve 1,215 days in the DOC, following his admission to violating the terms of his probation for the third time. “Probation is a criminal sanction wherein a convicted defendant specifically agrees to accept conditions upon his behavior in lieu of imprisonment.” Wilder v. State, 91 N.E.3d 1016, 1024 (Ind. Ct. App. 2018). “A defendant is not entitled to serve a sentence in either probation or a community corrections program. Rather, placement in either is a matter of grace and a conditional liberty that is a favor, not a right.” Holmes v. State, 923 N.E.2d 479, 482 (Ind. Ct. App. 2010) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). The trial court has discretion to set the conditions of probation and “to revoke probation if the conditions are violated.” Heaton v. State, 984 N.E.2d 614, 616 (Ind. 2013).

[12] Revocation of probation is a two-step process. “First, the trial court must make a factual determination that a violation of a condition of probation actually occurred. Second, if a violation is found, then the trial court must determine the appropriate sanctions for the violation.” Benitez v. State, 199 N.E.3d 811, 813 (Ind. Ct. App. 2022) (internal citation omitted). When a trial court has found a defendant violated the conditions of probation, the court may continue the probation, extend the term of probation, or “[o]rder execution of all or part of the sentence that was suspended at the time of initial sentencing.” Ind. Code § 35-38-2-3(h). “While it is correct that probation may be revoked on evidence of violation of a single condition, the selection of an appropriate sanction will depend upon the severity of the defendant's probation violation[.]” Heaton, 984 N.E.2d at 618.

[13] When a probationer appeals the trial court's decision regarding violation, sanction, or both, we review the decision for an abuse of discretion. Heaton, 984 N.E.2d at 616. “An abuse of discretion occurs where the decision is clearly against the logic and effect of the facts and circumstances, or when the trial court misinterprets the law[.]” Id. (internal citations omitted). When reviewing the sufficiency of the evidence presented, we look to the evidence most favorable to the judgment, and we neither reweigh the evidence nor reassess the credibility of the witnesses. Votra v. State, 121 N.E.3d 1108, 1113 (Ind. Ct. App. 2019).

[14] Hutchinson claims that the trial court abused its discretion by ordering him to serve 1,215 days in the DOC – “all but eight months of [his] suspended sentence of four years” (Appellant's Br. at 11) – because (1) he did not commit any new crimes or abscond; (2) “several of the violations arose from [his] failure to pay the [sex-offender treatment fees]” when he was experiencing financial difficulties (id.); (3) he admitted to and “took full responsibility for all of his violations” (id. at 12); (4) he made “some effort to comply with the requirements of probation and community corrections” (id.); (5) his criminal history, consisting of five misdemeanor convictions, is comparatively minor; and (6) his intellectual disability, from which he suffers, is a “serious mental defect which is universally recognized as a significant mitigating circumstance.” (Id. at 13.)

[15] We are unpersuaded that the facts and circumstances of this case warrant a lesser sanction than that imposed by the trial court. Hutchinson was convicted of Level 4 felony child molesting and sentenced to a term of imprisonment. Less than one week after Hutchinson's first release from the DOC to probation, he violated probation by failing to consent to a search of his computer device and viewing pornography. A few months later, he similarly violated probation by failing to consent to a search of his computer device and viewing pornography. He also failed to communicate truthfully with the probation department, comply with sex-offender registry requirements, and complete court-approved sex offender treatment. He deleted a pornographic video from his phone and possessed obscene matter.

[16] Between his second and third probation violations, Hutchinson violated the terms of his community-corrections placement four times, which eventually led the trial court to revoke his community-corrections placement and his probation, and order him to serve 1,095 days in the DOC, followed by four years on probation. After his release from the DOC, Hutchinson violated his probation for the third time, this time by failing to refrain from possessing obscene material, consent to a search of his personal computer, register with local law enforcement in a timely manner after being released to probation, and communicate truthfully with the probation department.

[17] While we are sympathetic to Hutchinson's intellectual disability, we cannot ignore that he violated the terms of his probation and community corrections placement a total of seven times, and most of his violations were far from technical. His repeated violations demonstrate an unwillingness or inability to comply with the terms of his probation, and past leniency afforded to Hutchinson by the trial court did not stop him from repeatedly violating his probation. Hutchinson also ignores that the trial court again showed leniency when sanctioning him by imposing eight months less than the four-year term the court could have imposed, stating that it did not impose the “full backup” of four years because Hutchinson had admitted to the probation violations. (Tr. Vol. 2 at 8.) That the trial court declined to reduce the sanction further does not render its sentencing decision clearly against the logic and effect of the facts before it.²

Conclusion

[18] Hutchinson has failed to demonstrate that the trial court's sanction was clearly against the logic and effect of the facts and circumstances. Thus, the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it ordered Hutchinson to serve 1,215 days of his previously suspended sentence as a sanction for his third probation violation. Accordingly, we affirm the trial court's judgment.

[19] Affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Hutchinson completed his five years of incarceration in August 2023 because he had already served two years in jail and had earned credit time by the time his sentencing hearing for the Level 4 felony child molesting conviction had taken place in September 2022. (See App. Vol. 2 at 23.)

2.   In his Appellant's Brief, Hutchinson provided a one-sentence assertion that the trial court's imposition of the 1,215-day sanction violated his “rights to due process and due course of law, under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution and Article One, Sections Twelve and Sixteen of the Indiana Constitution[.]” (Appellant's Br. at 9.) To the extent that he intended to raise these issues for our review, the issues are waived because he has failed to present cogent arguments. See generally Ind. Appellate Rule 46(A)(8)(a) (providing that appellant's brief “must contain the contentions of the appellant on the issues presented, supported by cogent reasoning”).

May, Judge.

Pyle, J., and Scheele, J., concur.